System and apparatus for flash memory data management

ABSTRACT

The system and apparatus for managing flash memory data includes a host transmitting data, wherein when the data transmitted from the host have a first time transmission trait and the address for the data indicates a temporary address, temporary data are retrieved from the temporary address to an external buffer. A writing command is then executed and the temporary data having a destination address are written to a flash memory buffer. When the flash memory buffer is not full, the buffer data are written into a temporary block of the flash memory. The writing of buffer data into the temporary block includes using an address changing command, or executing a writing command to rewrite the external buffer data to the flash memory buffer so that the data are written into the temporary block.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a Continuation application of U.S. application Ser.No. 13/443,342 filed on Apr. 10, 2012, which is a Continuationapplication of U.S. application Ser. No. 13/069,937 filed on Mar. 23,2011, now U.S. Pat. No. 8,219,764, which is a Continuation applicationof U.S. application Ser. No. 11/699,372 filed on Jan. 30, 2007, now U.S.Pat. No. 7,937,522 which claims the right of priority based on TaiwanApplication Serial Number 95142873, filed Nov. 20, 2006, the disclosureof which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of Invention

The invention relates to memory data management and, in particular, to adata writing method for managing flash memory data.

2. Related Art

Flash memory is a kind of storage system with the advantages of highaccess speed and high stability. It is non-volatile memory. That is,once data are stored in the flash memory, it no longer needs power tomaintain the data.

The structure of the flash memory is in units of blocks. Each block isfurther divided into pages or sections. If data need to be written intothe flash memory, a data writing command is executed to write data in anexternal buffer into the buffer of the flash memory before writing itinto the flash memory. Under the condition that NOP is 1, the data inthe memory page can be only written once. In practice, it is likely tooccur that data cannot fully occupy a flash memory block or the datastorage is not continuous. In these cases, the storage efficiency of theflash memory is reduced. Data defragmentation is employed to solve thisproblem. However, it requires a lot of time to reorganize data in theflash memory. In particular, once a destination address of the externalbuffer is assigned to the data, the current structure does not allow oneto change the destination address of the data already stored in theflash memory buffer or read the data out of the flash memory buffer.Moreover, such a structure is not suitable for speeding up the datadefragmentation.

It is therefore desirable to provide a new method for flash memory datamanagement to prevent from spending a lot of time re-organizing datatherein because of loose or discontinuous data distribution. The datastorage ability of the flash memory is better optimized by reducing thedependence on the external buffer.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

An objective of the invention is to provide a method for flash memorydata management to reduce the amount of time for re-organizing datatherein because of loose or discontinuous data distribution, therebyincreasing the data storage efficiency thereof.

In accord with the above-mentioned objective, the invention provides amethod for flash memory data management comprising the steps of: (a)writing data in an external buffer to a flash memory buffer, wherein thedata in the flash memory buffer has a destination address; and (b)checking the data stored in the flash memory buffer and using an addresschanging command to assign a temporary address to the data stored in theflash memory buffer and to write the data into the temporary block whenthe flash memory buffer is not full.

In accord with the above-mentioned objective, the invention provides amethod for flash memory data management comprising the steps of: (a)writing data in an external buffer to a flash memory buffer, wherein thedata in the flash memory buffer has a destination address; and (b)checking the data stored in the flash memory buffer and using an addresschanging command when the flash memory buffer is not full, wherein thewriting command deletes the data in the flash memory buffer andre-assigns an temporary address to the data; (c) writing the data in theexternal buffer to the flash memory buffer, wherein the data in theflash memory buffer has a temporary address; and (d) writing the data toa temporary block according to the temporary address.

In accord with the above-mentioned objective, the invention provides amethod for flash memory data management comprising the steps of: (a)determining an address for transmitting data by a host, wherein theaddress is an original destination address; (b) waiting for the host totransmit the data to an external buffer; (c) determining whether thedata in the external buffer have a first time transmission trait and,when they have the first time transmission trait, determining whetherthe address assigned by the host is a temporary address and, when theassigned address is a temporary address, reading temporary data in thetemporary address to the external buffer, and executing a writingcommand to re-assign a new destination address; (d) writing thetemporary data in the external buffer to a flash memory buffer; and (e)writing the data transmitted from the host in the external buffer to theflash memory buffer, wherein the data in the flash memory buffer havethe original or new destination address.

If the data in the external buffer do not have the first timetransmission trait, then step (e) is executed directly. When the data inthe external buffer have the first time transmission trait and the hostassigned data transmission address is not the temporary address, analgorithm is executed, followed by step (e). The algorithm includesorganizing the data in the external buffer so that they becomecontinuous.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

These and other features, aspects and advantages of the invention willbecome apparent by reference to the following description andaccompanying drawings which are given by way of illustration only, andthus are not limitative of the invention, and wherein:

FIG. 1 is a schematic view showing the flowchart of an embodiment of theinvention;

FIG. 2 is a schematic view showing the flowchart of another embodimentof the invention;

FIG. 3 is a schematic view showing the flowchart of yet anotherembodiment of the invention; and

FIG. 4 is a schematic view showing the application of the inventionaccording to the flowchart of FIG. 1 or FIG. 2.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of a flash memory system, which may beemployed to implement the methods depicted in the flowcharts of FIGS. 1and 2, according to the invention.

FIG. 5A is a block diagram of a flash memory system, which may beemployed to implement the method depicted in the flowcharts of FIG. 3,according to the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention will be apparent from the following detaileddescription, which proceeds with reference to the accompanying drawings,wherein the same references relate to the same elements.

The disclosed method for flash memory data management writes data into adestination block when a flash memory buffer is full and into atemporary block when it is not full. Another method for flash memorydata management according to the invention is for the case when datatransmitted from a host have a first time transmission trait and thewriting address of the data is a temporary address. In this case,temporary data are read to the external buffer and a writing command isexecuted to write the temporary data with a destination address to theflash memory buffer. Therefore, the invention can reduce the loose ordiscontinuous data distribution and the amount of time for re-organizingflash memory data. Moreover, it reduces the dependence on the externalbuffer to increase the data storage ability thereof.

The procedure of an embodiment of the invention is depicted in FIG. 1.Steps 102 and 104 takes a data writing command and a data address (e.g.,using 5 cycles to transmit data with a destination address),respectively. They are used to write data in an external buffer to aflash memory buffer (step 106). The written data has a destinationaddress. Step 108 checks the data stored in the flash memory buffer.When the flash memory buffer is not fill, an address changing command isused (step 110) to assign a temporary address to the data in the flashmemory buffer (step 112). The data are then written to a temporary blockof the flash memory (step 114). Steps 116 and 118 complete writing thedata.

With reference to FIG. 2, steps 202 and 204 take a data writing commandand a data address (e.g., using 5 cycles to transmit data with adestination address), respectively. They are used to write data in anexternal buffer to a flash memory buffer (step 206). The written datahas a destination address. Step 208 checks the data stored in the flashmemory buffer. When the flash memory buffer is not full, step 210executes a writing command. The writing command deletes the data insidethe flash memory buffer and re-assigns a temporary address to the datain the flash memory buffer (step 212). Step 214 re-writes the data inthe external buffer to the flash memory buffer. The data in the flashmemory buffer has the temporary address. Step 216 writes the data to atemporary block of the flash memory according to the temporary address.Steps 218 and 220 complete writing the data.

Please refer to FIG. 3. In step 304, a host determines a location fortransmitting data. The location is an original destination address. Step306 waits for the host to transmit the data to an external buffer. Step308 determines whether the data in the external buffer has the firsttime transmission trait. Step 310 determines whether the locationassigned by the host for transmitting the data is pointed to a temporaryaddress. In step 314, when the location assigned by the host fortransmitting data points to the temporary address, then temporary datain the temporary address are read to the external buffer. Afterwards,steps 316 and 318 execute a writing command for re-assigning an addressas a new destination address. Step 320 writes the temporary data in theexternal buffer to a flash memory buffer. Step 322 writes the data inthe external buffer transmitted from the host into the flash memorybuffer. The data in the flash memory buffer has the original destinationaddress or the new destination address.

More explicitly, in step 308, when the data in the external buffer donot have the first time transmission trait, step 322 is executeddirectly to write the data in the external buffer transmitted from thehost into the flash memory buffer. Alternatively, if in step 308 thedata of the external buffer have the first time transmission trait andthe location assigned by the host for data transmission in step 310 doesnot point to a temporary address, then step 312 executes algorithm toorganize the data in the external buffer so that they become continuous.Afterwards, step 322 is performed to write the data in the externalbuffer transmitted from the host to the flash memory buffer.

After the data transmitted from the host to the external buffer arewritten into the flash memory buffer, step 324 checks whether the actionof writing host data to the external buffer has stopped. After it isstopped, step 326 checks whether the flash memory buffer is full. Whenit is full, step 330 is performed to write data with a destinationaddress to a destination block. The destination address is either theoriginal destination address or the new destination address. If theflash memory buffer is found to be not full in step 326, step 328assigns a temporary block to the data. Step 329 writes the data to thetemporary block. Step 332 completes writing data to the flash memory.Step 334 finishes the data writing to the flash memory.

Step 328 involves the disclosed method of moving data in the yet fullflash memory buffer to the temporary block. As shown in FIG. 1, when theflash memory buffer is not full, an address changing command is used toassign a temporary address to the data in the flash memory buffer,writing the data to the temporary block. Alternatively, as shown in FIG.2, if the flash memory buffer is not full, a writing command isexecuted. The writing command deletes the data inside the flash memorybuffer and re-assigns a temporary address. The data in the externalbuffer are then written into the flash memory buffer. The data insidethe flash memory buffer have a temporary address and are written intothe temporary block accordingly.

After writing the data transmitted from the host to the external bufferinto the flash memory buffer, step 324 checks whether the action ofwriting the host data to the external buffer has been stopped. If thewriting is not over yet, step 336 checks the data stored in the flashmemory buffer. If the flash memory buffer is full, then step 338 writesthe data according to their destination address to a destination block.Step 340 completes writing the data to the destination block. In step342, the flash memory executes a writing command. Step 344 accumulatesthe destination address (e.g., accumulating the previous writingaddress). Afterwards, the procedure goes to step 306, followed by theabove-mentioned steps. The destination address is either the originaldestination address of the new destination address.

When the data are still being transmitted from the host to the externalbuffer, step 336 checks the data stored in the flash memory buffer. Ifthe flash memory buffer is not full, the procedure goes to step 322 towrite the data transmitted from the host to the external buffer into theflash memory buffer.

As shown in flowchart 400 of FIG. 4, a host determines a location fortransmitting data (e.g. a continuous series of data) in step 404. Thelocation is a destination address. Step 406 waits for the host totransmit the data to an external buffer. Step 408 determines whether thedata in the external buffer have a first time transmission trait. If thedata have the first time transmission trait, step 410 executes a headdata process to simplify subsequent data accesses. Step 412 writes thedata of the external buffer to a flash memory buffer. The data in theflash memory buffer has a destination address.

After the host transmits the data to the external buffer, the proceduredetermines whether the data have the first time transmission trait. Ifthe data do not have the first time transmission trait, step 412 isdirectly performed to write the data in the external buffer into theflash memory buffer.

Step 414 checks whether the action of writing the host data to theexternal buffer is over. If it is not over, then step 426 checks thedata stored in the flash memory buffer. Once the flash memory buffer isfull, step 428 writes the data according to the destination address to adestination block. Step 430 completes writing the data to thedestination block. In step 432, the flash memory executes a writingcommand. Step 434 accumulates the destination address (e.g.,accumulating the previous writing address). Afterwards, the proceduregoes back to step 406, followed by the above-mentioned steps.

When the data are still being written to the external buffer and theflash memory buffer is not full in step 426, the procedure goes back tostep 406 to continue the above-mentioned steps.

Step 414 checks whether the action of writing the host data to theexternal buffer is over. When it is over, step 416 checks the datastored in the flash memory buffer. Once the flash memory buffer is full,step 420 is executed to write the data with the destination address intoa destination block.

Once the action of writing the host data into the external buffer isover and the flash memory buffer is found to be not full in step 416,then step 418 assigns a temporary block to the data. The data arewritten into the temporary block in step 419. Step 422 completes writingthe data into the flash memory. Step 424 finishes the action of writingthe data to the flash memory.

Step 418 involves the disclosed method of moving the data in the yetfull flash memory buffer into the temporary block. As illustrated inFIG. 1, when the flash memory buffer is not full, an address changingcommand is used to assign a temporary address to the data in the flashmemory buffer for writing the data to the temporary block.Alternatively, as shown in FIG. 2, when the flash memory buffer is notfull, a writing command is executed. The writing command deletes thedata stored in the flash memory buffer and re-assigns a temporaryaddress. The data in the external buffer are then written to the flashmemory buffer. The data in the flash memory buffer has a temporaryaddress and are written into the temporary buffer accordingly.

FIG. 5 shows a block diagram of flash memory system 54 of the invention,which is coupled to a host 52. The flash memory system 54 comprises acontroller 542 and a flash memory 544. The controller 542 comprises anexternal buffer 5422, the external buffer 5422 being external to flashmemory 544. The flash memory 544 comprises a buffer 5442 and two blockscalled destination block 5444 and temporary block 5446. Each blockcomprises a plurality of pages and each page includes four sectors (512byte/sector). In addition, the destination block 5444 stores foursectors of data L0-L3.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram descriptively depicting structure to performthe methods depicted in the flow diagrams of FIGS. 1 and 2. The hostwould like to write 2 sectors of data from logical address 4 to logicaladdress 5 (L4˜L5). The controller 542 receives a write command and datafrom the host 52 (step 102 and step 104), then keeps the data in theexternal buffer 5422. When the write command is interpreted, thecontroller 542 transmits/moves/writes data in the external buffer 5422to buffer of flash memory 5442 (step 106), the written data (L4-L5) hasa destination address corresponding to the destination block 5444. Thecontroller 542 checks the buffer of flash memory 5442 is not full (step108), the controller 542 uses an address changing command (step 110) toassign a temporary address to the data in the buffer of flash memory 544(step 112). The data L4-L5 are then written to a temporary block 5446 ofthe flash memory 544 (step 114). Steps 116 and 118 complete writing thedata.

According to another embodiment of this invention, wherein the structureof FIG. 5 may be used to implement the method depicted in the flowchartof FIG. 2, the host would like to write two sectors of data from logicaladdress 4 to logical address 5 (L4-L5). The controller 542 receives awrite command and data from the host 52 (step 202 and step 204), thenkeeps the data in the external buffer 5422. When the write command isinterpreted, the controller 542 transmits/moves/writes data in theexternal buffer 5422 to buffer of flash memory 5442 (step 206), thewritten data (L4-L5) has a destination address corresponding to thedestination block 5444. The controller 542 checks that the buffer offlash memory 5442 is not full (step 208) and, if that is the case, thecontroller 542 resends a writing command (step 210). The writing commanddeletes the data in the buffer of flash memory 5442 and re-assigns atemporary address corresponding to the temporary block 5446 (step 212).Then, the controller re-writes the data L4-L5 in the external buffer5422 to the buffer of the flash memory 5442 (step 214). The data L4-L5are then written to a temporary block 5446 of the flash memory 544 (step216). Steps 218 and 220 complete writing the data.

FIG. 5A shows a block diagram of flash memory system 54A of thisinvention, which is coupled to a host 52A. The flash memory system 54Acomprises a controller 542A and a flash memory 544A. The controller 542Acomprises an external buffer 5422A, external to flash memory 544A. Theflash memory 544A comprises a buffer 5442A and two blocks calleddestination block 5444A and temporary block 5446A. In addition, thedestination block 5444A stores four sectors of data L0-L3 and thetemporary block 5446A stores two sectors of data L4-L5.

FIG. 5A is a block diagram descriptively depicting structure to performthe method depicted in the flow diagram of FIG. 3. The host now wouldlike to write two sectors of data from logical address 6 to logicaladdress 7 (L6-L7) (step 302). The controller 542A receives a writecommand and data from the host 52A (step 304 and step 306), then keepsthe data in the external buffer 5422A. The controller 542A determinesthe sector of data L6-L7 is first transmitted (step 308) and also theaddress of data sector L6-L7 is pointed to the temporary block 5446A(step 310). Then, the controller 542A reads data sector L4-L5 from thetemporary block 5446A to the external buffer 5422A (step 314).Afterwards, the controller 542A executes a writing command forre-assigning a new destination address corresponding to the destinationblock 5444A (steps 316 and 318). The controller 542Atransmits/writes/moves the data sector L4-L7 from the external buffer5422A to the buffer of flash memory 5442A (step 320 and step 322). Afterthe data sector L6-L7 transmitted from the host 52A to the externalbuffer 5422A are written into the buffer of flash memory 5442A, thecontroller 542A checks whether the action of host 52A has stopped (step324). After it is stopped, the controller 542A checks whether the bufferof flash memory 5442A is full (step 326). When it is full, thecontroller 542A would instruct the flash memory 544A to program dataL4-L7 to the destination address of the destination block 5444A (step330). When the flash memory 544A completes programming, it informs thecontroller 542A (step 332) and then the controller 542A informs the host52 that the process is finished.

The invention being thus described, it will be obvious that the same maybe varied in many ways. Such variations are not to be regarded as adeparture from the spirit and scope of the invention, and all suchmodifications as would be obvious to one skilled in the art are intendedto be included within the scope of the following claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. An apparatus for managing flash memory data,comprising: a flash memory including a flash memory buffer, a firstblock, and a second block; and a controller, external to the flashmemory, comprising an external buffer; wherein the controller isconfigured to receive a write command and data having a first addresscorresponding to the first block, and store the data in the externalbuffer; and wherein the controller is further configured to determine ifa data length of the data is not less than a page size of a page of thefirst block and, if the data length of the data is less than the pagesize of the page of the first block, the controller is configured tocause the data to be written to the second block.
 2. The apparatus ofclaim 1, wherein the controller is configured to receive the writecommand and the data having a first address from a host external to theapparatus.
 3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the data is written tothe second block responsive to assignment of a second address, withinthe flash memory buffer, to the data by the controller.
 4. The apparatusof claim 1, wherein when the data length of the data is not less thanthe page size of the page of the first block, the controller isconfigured to cause the data to be written to the first block inaccordance with the first address.
 5. The apparatus of claim 2, whereinthe controller is configured to determine whether storage of data fromthe host in the external buffer has stopped and the controller isfurther configured to determine if the data length of the data is lessthan the page size of the page of the first block responsive to thedetermination that storage of data from the host to the external bufferhas stopped.
 6. The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the controller isconfigured to determine whether storage of data from the host in theexternal buffer has stopped while the data is still being stored in theexternal buffer, determine whether the data length of the data is lessthan the page size of the page of the first block, and cause the data tobe written to the second block if the data length of the data is lessthan the page size of the page of the first block.
 7. The apparatus ofclaim 6, wherein when the data are still being stored in the externalbuffer and the data length of the data is not less than the page size ofthe page of the first block, the controller is configured to cause thedata to be written into the first block within the flash memoryaccording to the first address, and when the data are completely writtento the first block, the flash memory is configured to execute a writecommand and accumulate the first address.
 8. The apparatus of claim 1,wherein the controller is configured to cause the data to be written tothe second block by mean of sending or transmitting an address changecommand.
 9. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the controller isconfigured to cause the data to be written to the second block by meanof sending or transmitting a second write command.
 10. The apparatus ofclaim 9, wherein the second write command causes an operation fordeleting data in the flash memory buffer if the data is already in theflash memory buffer.
 11. A method for managing flash memory data to bestored in a memory device, wherein the memory device comprises a flashmemory including a flash memory buffer, a first block, and a secondblock and a controller, external to the flash memory, comprising anexternal buffer, the method comprising: receiving a write command anddata having a first address corresponding to the first block by thecontroller; and storing the data in the external buffer by thecontroller, wherein the controller is further configured to determine ifa data length of the data is not less than a page size of a page of thefirst block and, if the data length of the data is less than the pagesize of the page of the first block, the controller is configured tocause the data to be written to the second block.
 12. The method ofclaim 11, wherein the controller is configured to receive the writecommand and the data having a first address from a host external to thememory device.
 13. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the controller isconfigured to cause the data to be written to the second block by meanof sending or transmitting an address change command.
 14. The apparatusof claim 11, wherein the controller is configured to cause the data tobe written to the second block by mean of sending or transmitting asecond write command.
 15. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the secondwrite command causes an operation for deleting data in the flash memorybuffer if the data is already in the flash memory buffer.
 16. The methodof claim 11, wherein the data is written to the second block responsiveto assignment of a second address, within the flash memory buffer, tothe data by the controller.